%% Image selected per Image Pickin' thread: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=1366848712097001600%% Please do not replace or remove without starting a new thread.%%[[quoteright:272:[[WesternAnimation/JusticeLeague http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/rsz_conspiracyboard_h350_5959.jpg]]]]

->"''It was so much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. If it was Them, then nothing was anyone's fault. If it was us, what did that make Me? After all, I'm one of Us. I must be. I've certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We're always one of Us. It's Them that do the bad things.''"-->-- '''Creator/TerryPratchett''', ''Discworld/{{Jingo}}''

Conspiracy theories are, essentially, WildMassGuessing, {{Headscratchers}}, and FanonDiscontinuity (in the sense that something didn't happen according to the way "official" sources said it did) applied to RealLife. Like all memes, conspiracy theories mutate and interbreed almost too fast for humans to track. Any of the theories and sub-theories mentioned below can be, and in all likelihood has been, combined with any or all of the others by at least one person. Don't be surprised if the [[VoodooShark theory raises more questions]] than the original incident in the first place. The only thing such theories prove, if anything, is that we're all too human. [--or maybe illuminaty? D:--]

It is important to distinguish a Conspiracy ''Theory'' from a regular theory about a conspiracy. A conspiracy is merely a plan by more than one person to commit a crime, and a theory about it could be made. However, it is different from a Conspiracy Theory, as a Conspiracy Theory explicitly means a fringe theory which purports that events, either in the news or in history, are not as we understand it but really the works of secret cabals of cunning conspirators acting for malicious ends, from merely getting rich to propagating an ideology up to and including [[TakeOverTheWorld world domination]].

People who tend to have these can be found under "ConspiracyTheorist." The Creator/MelGibson film ''Film/ConspiracyTheory'' has its own article.

------>'''[[JustForFun/StatlerAndWaldorf Waldorf]]:''' Seems like a lot of people are plotting to TakeOverTheWorld.\\'''[[Series/TheMuppetShow Statler]]:''' This world? [[TakeThat Who would want it?]]\\'''[[ThoseTwoGuys Both]]:''' [[MemeticMutation Do-ho-ho-ho-hoh]]!